33 days until the election. get out register and votototototototototototototototototototototototototototot >> cenk: welcome to the "the young turks." unfortunately mitt romney might have listened to me. i would attack from the left. you say wait a minute. mitt romney is not a progressive, you're right. who cares. >> i'd repeal dodd frank. we're not going to get rid of all regulation. you have to have regulation. >> cenk: unfortunately, it worked. we'll tell you the results and we'll tell you how it worked on the show. then did president obama take it easy on romney because fox news has been charging him with being an angry black man because of this old clip. >> what is happening down in new orleans? where is your dollar? where is your money? it tells me that some how people in new orleans, they don't care about it as much. >> cenk: that is a really interesting debate.

we'll have that on the show. and then toby zeigler from the "west wing"." >> it's not rocket science, it's labeled, but it takes a voter extra ten seconds to find it. >> cenk: how he would have done last night. all that and the elbow of the day. well somebody elbowed themselves. you might have been able to guess it. that's all on "the young turks." guess what time is it? you know it. you guessed that too. it's go time. >> romney: i will not under any circumstances raise taxons middle income families. >> obama: he said his big bold idea is never mind. >> the defendant was not able to defend himself. >> i'm sorry i'll stop the subsidy to pbs. i love big bird.

>> he has been rehearsing for this since last june. >> i have no idea what you're talking about. i may need to get a new accountant. >> some fundamental dishonesty that we saw last night. >> we need more firement, more teachers, it's time to cut back on government. >> the reject the idea that i don't like teachers. >> romney had a momentum. >> i have to respond. >> i said i'm not a perfect man and i wouldn't be a perfect president, and that's probably a promise that governor romney thinks i kept. >> cenk: it's time to keep it real on "the young turks," that's what we do. you can tell from the banners behind me, it did not go well. the president was banged around. it was viewed by more people since 1980. look at that. according to a cnn poll 67-25 a walloping who saw that coming

other than governor granholm. not a lot of people. man, it wasn't pretty. today, president obama is probably having this moment, and i'm sure you know, it's called. [ speaking french ] i'm sure it's not pronounced that way. what actors think on the way to the stairs after the shows. oh i should have done it this way. i should have done it that way. we have an american version of that. it's the moment in "seinfeld" where c atstanza thinks of the joke he should have said. watch. >> george, the ocean called. they're running out of shrimp. >> oh, yes! that's what i should have said! >> oh, yeah? well the jerks store called, they're running out of you. >> cenk: yeah, yeah, but you gotta say it in the moment.

nonetheless, president obama with his moment today. >> i met this very spirited fellow who claimed to be mitt romney. [ chuckling ] but it couldn't have been mitt romney because the real mitt romney has been running around the country for the last year promising 5 trillion-dollar in tax cuts to pay for the wealthy. the fellow on stage last night said he didn't know anything about that. >> cenk: that was pretty good! you should have done it last night with 67 million people watching. all right well what happened instead, mitt romney attacked him over and over again. on this line about taking $716 billion out of medicare. how many times did he say it? count along with us. >> romney: medicare for current

retirees he's cutting $716 billion. because of those $716 billion in cuts. 716--$716 billion--$716 billion. you're going to see a $716 billion cut to medicare. and the president support taking $716 billion out of that program. >> cenk: he said it ten times! and every time literally screaming in the studios in new york going hit him back! that's not true! say it isn't true! instead, this is what president obama said. >> obama: um um, um, and um, and and um, now, um um, you

know that may not-- >> cenk: oooh! because of that he found himself in the middle of a ring going hey, what's going on? where did mitt go? oh no, he's on the top rung. we didn't want to see that. we didn't want to see that. then mitt romney sets him up perfectly. you know you got to mention bain. you got to mention the cayman islands and the swiss bank accounts. >> you say you get a deduction for taking a plant overseas. look i've been in business for 25 years. i have no idea what you're talking about. maybe i need to get a new accountant but the idea that you get a break for shipping jobs overseas-- >> cenk: i might need a new accountant? that's on a platter. had you go on, president obama hit it out. >> um, um, um. >> cenk: oooh, he's back in the middle of the ring. he's looking around for romney

and it's this--oh, dammit. dammit. all right then what president obama that drives me crazy the most the constant agreement with republicans. this is all from last night's debate. watch. >> obama: governor romney and i both agree corporate tax rates are too high. i suspect on social security we have similar position. and governor romney and i agree we got to boost american energy production. we've made enormous process on drawing on ideas on republicans and democrats. >> cenk: it's a debate! this is not when you agree. this is when you disagree! it's a debate! so unfortunately, i had given mitt romney some advice on how he can possibly win this thing

and i said, look, come at it from the left. watch what i said before the debate. >> i would attack from the left. you say wait a minute, mitt romney is not a progressive you're right. who cares. you think the media is going to call that out? they're not going to call that out. if mitt romney did a full attack on president obama during the debates from a progressive perspective, that would actually work. and he'd get to say what? i care about the middle class. think guy obviously doesn't. >> cenk: and i talked about the middle class. i talked about poverty banks etc. and then get a load of mitt romney the liberal last night. >> it's not working. and the proof of that is 23 million people out of work. the proof that have is one out of six people in poverty. the proof of that is we've gone from 32 million on food tampers stamps to 42 million on food stamps. >> i love great schools. massachusetts our schools are ranked number one of all 50 states. and the key to all schools

great teachers. i reject the idea that i don't want great teachers. >> you would repeal dodd frank. >> i would repeal and replace it. you're not going to get rid of all regulation. >> and they're guaranteed by the federal government. this is the biggest kiss given to new york banks i've ever seen. >> cenk: mitt romney attacking new york banks? what a joke! so president obama is going to hit this one out of the park. here is his response. >> um, um, um, ah. >> cenk: aaah! so where does he find himself? you guessed it, there he is again for the third time. oh god this sucks. all right. so what should he have said? are you kidding me? do you know that the top eight donors to mitt romney's campaign are all banks! goldman sachs, bank of america jpmorgan, morgan stanley credit

suisse citigroup, wells fargo barclays. they're all banks. that's who he's in league with. that's who he wants to protect. stop trying to hit him and hit him. expect he wasn't even trying to hit him. that's part of the problem. all right look, for this kind of conversation--laughing ] let's bring in michael. >> i'm totally uncomfortable with this epic fail thing. >> cenk: no offense. it's not meant towards you epic. >> no, i understand. >> cenk: our epic political correspondent michael shure to break it down: we had a mini debate before the debate. i came really hard from the left just like mitt romney did. but you had a better zinger than the president. let's watch that again. >> the president can turn around and say listen the average middle class family got $3,600 in tax breaks over the last three and a half years singles i've been president. >> cenk: mr. president, their

income went down 5%. >> their income went down. >> cenk: it went down. it didn't go up. >> the income, mr. romney, and don't talk to me like i'm your gardner. >> cenk: he should have done that. >> he should have, and listening to what your intro was, it wasn't about the $716 billion. people would have forgotten that. even if the president came back and said it's not $716 billion, you're prong and whatever he would have said. it'sit's the demeanor. the lack of fight. it wasn't the specifics. he seemed tired. you know, and romney was successful. i think the president was a little befuddled because he wasn't expecting to debate massachusetts-mitt. he was expecting to debate and preparing to debate the candidate who has been out there onhe stump. >enen t tt's what weat ce lcadad da fda fouou u have to be prepared for everything. >> you do have to be prepared. i'm just guessing but that's what it seemed like. >> cenk: the other thing, it seemed like they didn't want to debate hard. they didn't want to go aggressive. watch here one of the top campaign strategists for

president obama as he explains what happened after the debate. >> on the 47% that's an issue that 100% of the country knows about. it's been chewed over and why it's romney's problem it wasn't a gaffe. it's a revealing moment in how he would use the middle class on this country. we ran ad on it. our strategy was not zingers necessarily. >> cenk: well, apparently that was the wrong strategy. when i watched that i got the sense that i thought not lay down but play defense. >> it reminded me of mitt romney debating in the primaries. how he would just stay back, let them all fight it out let them attack him and be impervious. but he was going up against a number of people. obama, if he adopted that strategy, he was going up against one person and it didn't work at all. what david was saying about 47% this is a silver lining thing but the 47% conversation leads

itself to a town hall type of debate, which is what the next debate will be like. >> cenk: they'll come out much harder. please tell me that they learned their lesson. >> i think the president will come out, but romney has mojo now. he has confidence and he'll carry that into the next debate. >> cenk: will it make a difference. >> in the short term the debate will make a difference. i don't think it's an enduring change. even today you see the people first of all i saw a poll on cnn, 67% to 25% as we talked about. who are the 25% that felt the president won the debate. >> cenk: well, partisans. they're going to say obama won no matter what. >> what mitt romney is doing which will not go by is the politics of a wink and a nod. he's looking at his right wing and say let me get there. i'll do what you want me to do. in order to get there and to win i got to be massachusetts mitt,-- >> cenk: it worked.

he went to the center and he went there very aggressively. and he did a great job the other night. when we come back we'll tell you what president obama did right and talk about which pundits and politicians actually got it right before the debate. >> so i have absolute confidence when we get to thursday morning, we'll be shaking our head it's a brand new race. >> cenk: it sucks that he was right. did president obama take it easy on romney because fox has been charging over the last two days he's an angry black man? >> what is happening in new orleans? what is your dollar? where is your money? (vo) john fugelsang sees what happens. >> you know, blaming this economy on barack obama is kinda like blaming your hangover on the guy making breakfast. i like mitt romney but i'm sorry. they guy has flipped more than a crack house mattress. this campaign has become so toxic, beverly hills housewives are now injecting it into their foreheads. (vo) so current gave him a

weekly show. >> i love romney's debate style, but i tell you, if i could be that stiff for 90 minutes, i'd ... (vo) we probably won't regret it. alright let's break it down. mom, pop it. ♪ ♪ two inches apart, becky. two inches. t-minus nine minutes. [ ding ] [ female announcer ] pillsbury cinnamon rolls. let the making begin. ♪ ♪ hmm these smell amazing, too bad

the guys aren't here we're clear. ok, swarm! swarm! hello [ female announcer ] pillsbury chocolate chip cookies. let the making begin

[ ♪ theme music ♪ ] >> cenk: now, it wasn't all bad for president obama last night. did he have a couple of good lines in there. if you take them by themselves, you say those were good points. on the issues of the tax cuts. he has tax cuts and he won't say how he's going to pay for them. but the math doesn't add up. president obama hit him with a good line on that. >> obama: for 18 months he has been run on this tax plan, and now five weeks before the election he's saying that his big bold idea is "never mind." >> cenk: well, that's a good line because in fact romney went in and said, what me? i didn't do that.

that was nonsense. now on the issue of medicare and cuts to senior citizens here's what romney said. >> romney: neither the president nor i are proposing any changes for any current retirees or near retirees either to social security or medicare. so if you're 60 or around 60 or older, you don't need to listen any further. >> cenk: here's my favorite line from president obama in response to that. >> obama: your 54, 55, you might want to listen because this will effect you. >> cenk: in other words, yeah, when he says, hey senior citizens hey i'm not going to screw you. he's saying 50 and 54-year-olds, i'm going to screw you instead. the fact that the president pointed that out i thought he did a good job responding on medicare. to bring in the discussion on this, joel joe williams, political

reporter and commentator and michael hirsch, great to have you both here. joe, let me start with you. first, just as a matter of how bad was it last night, is it as bad as i thought it was? or i just showed you some good lines. did he have some saving graces? >> it was pretty bad. let's not sugarcoat it. i'm thinking dallas cowboys-chicago bears on monday night. obama was not quite as prohibitively bad as that, but it wasn't his best performance. he wasn't on his game. typically he gets stronger as these sorts of things tend to go on. so i think you'll see him come back in the debates the town hall format does favor him as you said earlier. he'll come back stronger, and he now knows what to expect. i think he did a very good job of laying out policies specific and being presidential and the adult in the room. and i also think contrary to a

lot of public opinion romney helped him putting stuff out there that has been fact-checked all day long, the medicare thing, the pre-existing things, the tax cut things, very serious people have taken a good hard look at this overnight and come to the conclusion that romney was full of it. that's going to be an issue going forward where you can capitalize on romney from last night. that will be a good starting point for the president. >> cenk: michael, i want to show a clip from our coverage on current where vice president gore had a you unique opinion on what what might have gone wrong here. >> obama arrived in denver at 2:00 p.m. today just a few hours before the debate started. romney did his debate prep in denver. when you go to 5,000 feet, and you only have a few hours to adjust--

>> cenk: was that attack--there are a million things that went wrong. that's not why president obama lost over all but was that a mistake to go that late into denver. >> people do get altitude sickness, even sometimes at a mile high, but i think it was reflective of a bigger problem. president obama was being the president. he doesn't have to spend an entire day or day in denver. 's the president. if you watched him last night that's what he behaved like. a guy who for four years has gone unchallenged at least in the same room with anyone. his demeanor, his answers from exactly what you saw during presidential press conference over the last few years. that's the way he responded to romney, to whom he barely acknowledged. he was acting like this was just you know, something that he didn't have to deign to do. that was a huge mistake.

it will be a wake-up call to him. it's very much like to me what happened in 2004 when you recall the first debate with john kerry, george w. bush was a little peevish and snapish because he was coming in to the first debate as the guy who had been the president for the previous four years. >> cenk: that's an interesting point. you know i hate to give the right wing any kind of credence but they've been calling him a celebrity, and i don't think it applies in a lot of ways, but this may have been one case where like celebrities no one challenges them in their own little bubble. in their room nobody says you're wrong, this is not the right way to go. i wonder if he fell into that trap, joe, where he thought well i got this thing locked down. we're up by ten in ohio. my advisers say take it easy. no one is saying that i'm doing anything wrong in the four years. in the press they are but not in the room, as michael was pointing out did it lead to overconfidence. >> i don't know if overconfidence is exactly the right word, but we have a

president who famously said he does not pay attention to cable tv news shows, and certainly if he had watched yours on monday night or any other ones there would have been keys and signs he should have taken very seriously how there are flaws and weaknesses in his performance. look when he was in denver he delivered pizzas to some poll workers and he said, debate prep is a drag. i hate this stuff. so right there you had a moment where he was acknowledging that this is not his favorite thing to do, and if you are the president of the united states with missiles and armies at your command a lot of sometimes you don't have to do what you don't want to do. certainly he needed to take it a bit more seriously in my opinion. i think he'll take it a bit more seriously from now on and i think we'll see a different set of circumstances in the town hall meeting in a couple of days. >> cenk: i didn't know the denver story. that is an interesting insight to it. i want to go to the moderator issue. jim lehrer was criticized.

watch this. >> right right. >> let's just stay on taxes. >> well, but virtually everything he just said about my tax plan is inaccurate. >> all right. >> we're way over our first 15 minutes. >> fun. >> it's great: no problem. if you don't have a problem. i don't have a problem. >> jim, the president began the segment so i think i get the last word. >> but i think you get the first word in the next segment. >> but he got the first word and-- >> cenk: that was not president. jim lehrer put out a statement. i thought the for nat accomplished its purpose which was facility direct extended exchanging between the candidates about issues of substance. him getting out of the way and letting them debate, i got no problems with that but isn't the role of the journalist to challenge these guys whether it's president obama or mitt romney so we have a clearer

sense of what they are policy plans and proposals? >> that was the sense that lehrer lost control of it. there were no comebacks from him, well, what do you mean by $716 billion? is that really true that that's simply being robbed from being medicare recipients which it's not. on those kinds of points you expect a good moderator to come back and hit both candidates over their misrepresentations. i think lehrer, i think he was trying to cover too much territory. on one hand that's good they covered enormous landscape. but on the other hand he lost control of it and early on within the first few minutes it was out of his hands. >> cenk: we're going to have to leave it there. michael hirsch, joe williams, thank you so much. i appreciate it. >> my pleasure. >> cenk: to be fair. it was not just chris christie who got the debate right. our own jennifer granholm said

that president obama would lose, and unfortunately she was right. when we come back, we'll talk to toby zeigler and talk about the theatrics about last night. what michael shure said was right. the president looked tired he didn't look as confident. how much of a difference will that make welcome we'll discuss that when we return. >> previously on the "west wing" wing." >> it's not rocket science, but it takes the voter an extra season seconds to find it. >> cenk: hey, there is richard. we'll talk to him in just a minute. and then later in the program the elbow of the day. someone delivers it on themselves. you can guess it. we'll share it later in the program. >>(narrator) bill press is on current tv. >>liberal and proud of it. >>(narrator) unafraid, outspoken, and above all politically direct. >>we'll do our best to carry the flag from 6 to 9 every morning.

[ ♪ music ♪ ] >> cenk: no a lot of us progressives were frustrated with how the debate went last night. we hoped that it would go something more like this. >> the government can't raise kids mr. president, parents have to. >> i have three grown daughters governor, do you want to tell me how to raise my family? do you want to tell other american fathers and mothers what they're doing wrong? >> i didn't say. >> i think you did. let's do what government do, we collect money and. >> we just lost the vote of every stay-at-home mom and husband who is are impacted. >> who are you now? >> i liked the aggressive

answer. it's just right. >> i'm with toby. richard schiff was playing toby ziegler there in "west wing." and so often in this administration i thought of "west wing" and thought why don't they do it that way? richard is going to join us now of course, richard not only won an emmy award for "west wing," but he's on broadway coming up soon and producer and actor on "chasing the hill." >> which we have to thank you for joining our cast in episode one. you were fantastic. >> cenk: thank you i appreciate it. i'm looking forward to a scene with you. >> any time. we're rehearsing right now. >> cenk: great. so i want to ask you as a director how would you have directed president obama differently last night? >> um, um, you know, the interesting thing is that you mentioned glen gary and glen ross as opposed to the "west wing," which we're rehearsing right now on broadway. i would next time for the

preparation i would get ricky roma from glen gehrig and glen ross in the room with president obama so that obama can practice dealing with lies, prevarications that people have been saying all day ricky the salesman. the salesman is a liar. romney to me comes across as a car salesman and you want to get out that have room because you're going to buy six cars before he's done with you. so practice. i'll give you an example of how easy it is to lie and how believable it is. let's just say i just told your watch and ask me if i stole your watch. >> cenk: you just took my watch. >> no, i didn't. >> cenk: i think did you. >> no, i didn't. why would i steal your watch. that's the most ridiculous thing i ever heard. does it look like i'm wearing a watch. >> cenk: i think i just saw it take it. >> 25 years i haven't worn a watch. you can ask my wife, my kids. i don't care what time it is.

and if i do, i check my phone. i don't even need a watch. why would i take your watch. >> cenk: goddamn it, j.r. did jayar, did you take the watch. >> why are you accusing me of taking a watch. it's so easy to pick a lie and stickstick to it. it's much harder if you're having any semblance of wanting to tell the truth to look someone in the eye and deal with it because it makes your jaw dropped. the president is a little bit taken off guard by the audacity of the lies, the repeated make believes that romney was throwing at him. it stuns you when it happens to you. i was on hannity during the democratic convention, and you sit down and you say hello and then he throws spears--he throws facts and numbers and studies and what about this, and what with that and you're ducking and saying what's the point of that? you can throw anything at

someone and say that that's the truth. and throw them off guard. so i would practice that. i would practice people throwing crap at you and then find a way to roll up your sleeves and deal with it like a man. not look down. not hide. >> cenk: so, that's what i want to get to next. you mentioning is really important, looking down and how the president looked throughout the debate. because that also sends a visual cue to the audience. i want to show you how it looked last night and then your comments. >> taking over healthcare for the entire nation, and whiskey aside the tenth amendment. look hyped us, the constitution and the declaration of independence. and then i do have a plan that deals with people with pre-existing conditions. that's part of my healthcare plan. >> cenk: so what can he do with that richard? >> well, it's clearly a problem

because if i was playing let's say i was acting and playing someone who was lower status to someone next to me, i would defer, i would look down, i would be afraid to be direct. like i said before, i think that came from not--the inability to face the lies head on, and not knowing what to do about if, but the result was he came across as inferior in a way. there was a great article in the the atlantic last month about this angry black man phenomenon. i had a stepfather that i grew up with for some partly of my life who was a civil rights leader, clarence jones. he was martin luther king jr.'s lawyer. obama reminds me of growing up a little bit with this man because he was in the business world. he was in the political world and he had to keep a certain demeanor. he was successful, so he moved up to a fancy neighborhood in

the bronx, believe it or not there was one back then in riverdale, and he would go jogging every morning. every single morning he was stopped by the police. this was 1960--1970. he always managed to keep an integrity about him. and a dignity about him. i think he had to do that out of political necessity. out of survival. that article in the atlantic talked about whether obama has the freedom to react like he would really emotionally want to react. i don't know. what do you think about that? we all want him to just deck him. we all want him to roll up his sleeves and deal with the lies head on and say i'm sorry, are you talking to me? you know what i mean? and just walk over and go, look me in the eye and say that again, pal, because i got some things i'm going to say right back at you. it seems like he can't do that.

>> cenk: that's a really powerful story. we're going to do a whole different segment on the whole angel black man phenomenon. it's something that white people don't understand. if you don't live through it every day. like your stepfather, if you didn't get stopped every day while jogging you don't understand the reaction you have from that. >> it takes one reaction and the next thing you know you're behind bars, at least back in that era. i don't know what the fear is, if that's unleashed here, but clearly it has to do some very inherent sense of race that we have in this country. >> cenk: richard schiff, everybody check out "chasing the hill" online. thank you for joining us, i really appreciate it. >> my pleasure. take care. >> cenk: stay tune for that segment, and we'll bring in tricia rose and bring everyone in to discuss the real factor in the debate. and then when we come back big

bird versus sheldon adelson. what actually cost our government so much more money. >> i'm sorry jim i'm going to stop the subsidy to pbs. i like pbs. i love big bird. i actctctctctctctctctctctctctctctctctctctctctctctctctctctctctctct (vo) she gets the comedians laughing and the thinkers thinking. >>ok, so there's wiggle room in the ten commandments, that's what you're saying. (vo) she's joy behar. >>current will let me say anything.

[ ♪ theme music ♪ ] >> cenk: everybody remembers that big bird moment were last night's debate. this is where mitt romney said he would get tough on the budget by going after p bs. >> romney: i'm sorry jim i'll stop the subsidy to pbs. i like pbs. i like big bird, i like you. but i'm not going to borrow

money from china to pay for it. >> cenk: i like you, too how con descending did that sound? but let's look at the overall budget. $3.5 trillion. corporation public broadcasting, $444 million. to give you a sense of how small that is, what size of the budget is it? .012% of the budget. that's how you're going to solved the deficit? by getting rid of .012% of the budget? and speaking of jokes, everybody went crazy over big bird. immediately there was a big bird account and said if romney had grown up with me he wouldn't have all his numbers screwed up. not bad strike out. we should have done an elbow of big period on romney's head. i'm going to get to sheldon in a second, but do you know the

5 trillion-dollar in tax cuts that mitt romney is proposing 50% would go to the top 5%. $2.5 trillion to the top 5%. and you're worried about the less than half a billion that corporation for public broadcasting is going to get? then let's go to sheldon adelson. there was a great report done by the center for action fund. if mitt romney gets elected. $2.3 billion sheldon adelson saves over four years. that's just one guy. remember, corporation for public broadcasting $444 million. but $2.3 billion for sheldon adelson. that's not all. romney would get rid of the estate attacks. that will save sheldon adelson $8.9 billion. just for the sheldon adelson family, if romney is elected it will cost the american government over $11 billion. but you're worried about big bird? you're worried about big bird?

now do you know that p bs, it only gets $22.3 million. so, how much would sheldon adelson's tax breaks fund corporation for public broadcast broadcasting corporation for public broadcasting? 25 years for just one person's tax breaks or pbs you could fund for nearly 500 years if you just take away the extra tax breaks sheldon adelson would get under the romney administration. you want to talk about priorities? that's mitt romney's priority. i'm going to take sesame street away from all the kids in the country. i'm going to take pbs away from all of so i can give sheldon adelson the breaks he wants that could actually fund pbs for 500 years. that's republican priority. now when we come back did president obama take it easy on

mitt romney because fox news and conservatives kept calling him an angry black man? really interesting conversation. we'll have that when we return. >> jim, you may want to move on to another topic but i would say this to the american people. >> obama does not have the latitude that white guys who start you morning with a daily dose of politics from a fresh perspective. >>i'm a slutty bob hope. the troops love me. >>only on current tv. home of the brave. ♪ ♪ it's where fear goes unwelcomed... ♪ ♪ and certain men... find a way to rise above. this is the land of giants. ♪ ♪ guts.

glory. ram.

[ ♪ theme music ♪ ] if you didn't notice, this week fox news and a lot of visit websites went crazy over the exclusive video clip they have ofof president obama that they found. except it wasn't exclusive and

they ran it back in 2004 when he said it, and they ran it the last campaign, but they are what they are and they do it for a reason. the whole idea is oh, my god the president is an angry black man. look at what he says in this video. >> what is happening down in new orleans? where is your dollar? where is your money? it tells me that some how the people down in new orleans they don't care about it as much. >> cenk: they literally called him an angry black man on that, and then during the debate i started getting tweets from you guys, the viewers and others who began to say the same thing. wait a minute, is there some chance that president obama overreacted to fox news doing this kind of attacks so he didn't want to appear angry so he wasn't way too mute during the debate. let's discuss that and the professor joins us as well from brown university.

michael, ana and jayar here. previewsprofessor, let me start with you. is that a legitimate possibility why president obama has been less forceful last night? >> listen, it's more than a possibility. there is not an ice cube's chance in hell that both sides have not been acutely aware of the mountains of scholarly evidence that black men are perceived as a threat before they speak and all as a group--and when they do, look down look away and defer. it reduces that initial perception. there are incredibly interesting studies on this, both sides definitely are aware of this. that is why i think why romney was baiting obama hoping that the angry black man would pop out and also why obama might have shown that deference.

>> you getter not criticize george bush you'll look like wild crazy liberals. >> i disagree a little trish a little despite the fact that she is the scholar, you don't have to be a scholar to know that this is part of american fabric, but the president, he was beat. he was tired. he lost the debate. he didn't have fire in his belly last night. he's never really the angry black man. the people who don't like him because he's a black man, not because he's an angry black man. yes that video comes out and they see that and jeremiah wright and all that, but the president was just off his game. to overread into this i think is doing a disservice to the whole process. >> cenk: go ahead professor. >> sorry sorry michael number one, the studies that have been done reveal that--that's why i started with the main study from dartmouth that shows this is

silent black men who are perceived immediately as a threat before they did anything. obama did not have to be an angry black man. that's the point of angry black man. black men are already angry before they do anything. so when they do display anger they're frighteningly angry. it's unconscious misperception. i'm not calling people racist, i'm not getting into all that. the point is this is happening categorically across the board no matter people's political orientation. that's the power. romney's side is working it. that's why all the conservatives drag out this angry so-called footage. this is why obama is almost always, not just last night but interestingly deference actual actual{^l"^^}. >> of course, they're already

recognizing the obama administration they're already recognizing. when he interrupted jim lehrer, he smiled over more things last night that no one would smile about. why is he smiling. all the sometimes he was looking down and it was over the top. mr. romney finish your point. >> cenk: on the other hand, i understand michael's point too. it's not that president obama never debated before. >> yes, he is a known quantity. >> cenk: and how many times have we covered president obama reacting to fox news. oh, my god, glenn beck is going to talk about shirley sherod i got to do something. in this case fox news does the direct attack immediately before the debate. could he have reacted to fox news. >> i think it is a direct possibility that he has had past experience of fox news criticizing him and then he acts on it. there could be a number of

different factors at play. what michael said was also correct. he was not on his a-game. he may have been been overconfident going into the debate. he's not working that hard. romney is shooting himself in the foot. >> cenk: i think you all made great points and president obama may not be doing it on purpose but because of what he has had to do his whole life as professor rose is pointing out to some degree. eliot spitzer has got "viewpoint" next. eliot, what do you have. >> eliot: i hear there was a debate last night cenk. we'll let people talk about that and pars over the obama campaign and see how they can resurrect themselves. you and i still predict that they're going to win big. voter i.d. has been the pennsylvania statute struck down or the delayed implementation. big and important news in terms of november. here in new york the innocence

project, a great group of folks 300 person found to be convicted wrongly will get out of jail. we'll talk about folks out of there, and how they do it and we'll shed light on the criminal justice system. >> cenk: sound great. when we come back, the elbow of the day. you know who it is. you cannnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn (vo) she gets the comedians laughing and the thinkers thinking. >>ok, so there's wiggle room in the ten commandments, that's what you're saying. (vo) she's joy behar. >>current will let me say anything. enm01525

w of the day on thursday. there was some good responses but here's our favorite. we decided to go with it. minuteel warner said obama drops an elbow on himself for playing too much defense. mitchell that's a good point.

now look, here's what president obama largely said during the debate. >> obama: uh uh. >> cenk: on the other hand president obama countered with this -- >> obama: uh uh -- uh, uh. >> cenk: so it wasn't about romney. unfortunately, it was president obama so he finds himself in the middle of the ring. but it wasn't so much romney up there. it was actually, unfortunately president obama himself. look you can't play prevent defense. yes, you have a huge lead. yes, i've talked about it but this is not the time to go soft. don't worry about what fox news is saying. don't worry about anything else. you go on the attack and stay on the attack and everybody don't panic, okay? they've run a brilliant campaign so far. this was a huge misstep but it doesn't mean anything overall. they